Blog 2023 Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Yesterday a minister resigned and received accolades from across the party spectrum but especially from the Tory back benches in the Commons. The spat is over betting machines, about which this blog knows next to nothing, but the budget is already overshadowed. More to the point opinion polls show that the vast majority believe austerity has not ended.

It was rumoured that Brexit negotiators were close to a financial services deal with the EU, but this notion was rubbished by Brussels within hours. The Americans have gone bananas over the new Google etc tax, which they say discriminates against American companies and will make a trade deal with the UK difficult. Dominic Raab tells us that he expects to have an exit deal together with a good outline of a trade deal  to follow, by November 21st. He is off to Brussels today so we should soon know if this is wishful thinking or leaked fact.

If it is fact the chances of the deal getting through the Commons are not good unless it meets all of Labour’s tests, which seems unlikely. Meanwhile the pressure on public services is causing most of them to come very close to dysfunction (more dreadful statistics of police under funding, under manning and overstretching today) which in turn is likely to build to a point where the government itself is crushed.

A week is a long time in politics. For this government it needs to be. It might not have many left.